845 S Lake St
Los Angeles, CA 90057, USA

Susana Machado Bernard House and Barn

Except from the Summary of Significance:

The Susana Machado Bernard House is significant as one of three known Art Nouveau Gothic mansions remaining in the Los Angeles area, and the only known remaining residence designed by John Parkinson, a distinguished early Los Angeles architect who designed the Memorial Coliseum and innumerable commercial buildings as well as an associate architect for Los Angeles City Hall and Union Station. The house and barn are fine examples of master craftsmanship and detailing. The house and barn retain almost all of their original fabric and character. Both structures have been declared Los Angeles Historic Cultural Monument #208.

The original owner, Mrs. Susana Machado Bernard was born on February 8, 1839, in Los Angeles. She married Jean Bernard, a wealthy Swiss-French businessman on November 27, 1865 in Los Angeles. They had eleven children. Mr. Bernard died in 1889. Mrs. Bernard built the home in 1901-02 and lived in it until her death in 1907. The home remained in the Bernard family until 1962.

(From "The Machados & Rancho La Ballona" by Sister Mary Ste. Therese Wittenberg, SND.) "Susana Machado Bernard would be considered landed gentry as her father was Augustin Machado who, in 1820-21 laid claim, with his brother Ignacio and the brothers Talamantes to a 14,000-acre Spanish land grant called Rancho La Ballona on what is now Marina Del Rey, Playa Del Rey, and parts of Culver City. Augustin’s father was Jose Manuel Machado who travelled from Sinaloa state in Mexico in 1781 under the command of Baja governor Don Fernando Rivera, who led an expedition to found the pueblo Nuestra Senora La Reina de Los Angeles. The expedition arrived at the Mission San Gabriel in the summer of 1781 and the pueblo of Los Angeles was founded on September 4, 1781.